Record-breaking winner of all the major science fiction awards - the Hugo, Nebula, Arthur C. Clarke, and Locus - Ann Leckie has a huge, enthusiatic fan following of her Imperial Radch Trilogy:…Read More

This is part of a large Commentary that I wrote in March 2008, all about the United Nations:

The United Nations is after taxes again. They blame the USA and people who could be taxed and leached upon while their communist friends in China, India, or South Korea can pollute the air all day and all night. Well, the capitalist smoke really bothers them, but not the marijuana smoke – first or second hand.

15,000 Global Warming jihadists, the environmental activists with their chief alarmist Al Gore, met in Bali a while ago to urge all nations to hurry up and sign the new treaty. It is like a band of bank robbers – hurry up before they find out that we have looted them.

The media continues to neglect to mention that President Bush will not sign the Kyoto Agreements because the world’s worst polluters, China and India, are exempt from cleaning up their filth.

Who do you think paid for this nice winter vacation for most of the delegates? The U.N. – from money they collected for the Indonesian tsunami victims. They collected over $1 billion (with a B), and gave out less than $100 million, so they are having a good time on your donations.

The U.N. also wants to highjack the internet domain registration control from the U.S. so countries like Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, and others could block internet travel not approved by the dictators.

The United Nations, under the L.O.S.T. Treaty, wants to control the seas all around the world, and the minerals and oil in the sea beds, tax the resources and distribute it among third-world countries. The Robin Hoods of New York, the U.N., will get a very handsome commission, plus the control where our Navy can sail or not sail. We are totally sick of this United Nations mafia.

Kudos to you Zolton for shining a light on much of this important information.

Isn’t it time for We the People to direct our government to resign from the United Nations, which we have tolerated and subsidized for more than 60 years? They routinely veto whatever our U.S. representatives recommend and have leached upon us long enough. Clearly, their agenda is to rule the world. America – Please Wake Up before it’s too late!

In the early 1930s when Hitler became leader of Germany, his first Law was to take the guns away from the people, so the Jews went quietly to the ovens, six million of them, including my maternal uncle and his family. I was a child at that time.

I am a vigorous opponent of gun control because it is naïve and stupid to believe that taking guns away from citizens will eliminate or lessen crimes – that is nuts!

Listen to the following news from Australia, which underscores the folly of taking guns away from the people. This is dated 3-5-2006, and it is from Ed Chenel, a Police officer in Australia:

“Hi Yanks, I thought you would like to see the real figures from Down Under. It has now been 6 months since gun owners in Australia were forced by a new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed by our own government, a program costing Australian taxpayers more than $500 million.

The first year’s results are in now:

Australia-wide, homicides are up 8.2%. Australia-wide, assaults are up 9.6%. Armed robberies are up 44% – yes, 44% in the State of Victoria alone. Homicides with firearms are now up 300%, and that while the law-abiding citizens turned them in, the criminals did not, and criminals still possess their guns.

While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robbery with firearms, this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months since the criminals now are guaranteed that their victims are unarmed. There have also been dramatic increases in break-ins and assaults of the elderly while the resident is in the home.

Australian politicians are at a loss to explain how public safety was decreased after such monumental efforts, and expenses are expended in successfully ridding Australia of guns. You will not see this in the American evening news, or hear your Governor or members of the State Assembly disseminating this information, because they have an idiotic mental block.

The Australian experience speaks for itself. Guns in the hands of honest citizens save lives and property, and gun control laws affect only the law-abiding citizens. It is a no brainer! Take note Americans before it is too late. Remember guns do not kill people – people kill people. Put another way, when guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns! Please forward this information to everyone you know. Do not be a member of the silent majority. Be one of the vocal minority who will not let this happen in the USA.”

I wrote this story about my mother in 1981, two years after her death. I was studying clinical philosophy at that time, a new discipline, which was deep, personal, and analytical, and while I was still missing my mom, I thought about her a great deal then.

Parents and children have powerful and intimate relationships and perspectives about each other – sometimes positive, sometimes negative, and sometimes neutral. Here I reveal my mother through my own appreciation of being a child, a parent, and a grandparent. I address a philosophical problem, that of finding a sense of groundedness in response to the universal human problem of the abyss – that is, the lack of meaning and aloneness – or nothingness. My mother found her ground in God, and in so many ways, now I do, too.

This is called “My Mother’s Ground”.

She came to America from Greece in 1912, or thereabouts, at the age of 16. The fourth in a family of six children, quite poor, she had been a young schoolteacher in her village. Her sister and brother-in-law living in New York sent her the money to join them in the land of hope and opportunity.

She met and married my father, had three children, became a widow at 42. With the three of us married, or gone soon after, she remained alone in the big house, and somehow managed to make the money last.

We worried and wondered at her aloneness every night. She would say to me “God will take care of me, I’m not afraid.” God was my mother’s ground.

An invalid for six years, and in need of continual custodial care, my 82-year-old mother spent her final years in a local convalescent home. At times, she was amazingly alert – other times, forgetful. Most often, strangely peaceful and content. In the early days of her confinement, she would often ask in bewilderment “Por que el Dios mi hizo esto ” (Why did God do this to me?)

Interestingly, after her second stroke, she communicated almost exclusively in Spanish, her native tongue, despite the fact that she had been quite articulate in English.

What made it possible for my mother to face each day with valor, even a smile? Her philosophy, which she affirmed each day when we were together, and that was every day, “Todo lo que hace Dios es para bien” (Everything that God does is for good). God was my mother’s ground.

In a way, I envied her very much, but I do not believe she ever allowed herself to see the abyss. She chose very early in her life to insulate herself from the anxiety of nihilism by a total and daily commitment to the will of God.

What a fascinating and incongruous polarity of personality was my mother: A most gentle benign imposition of an iron will in areas concerning her children, and a personal complete and total surrender to the will of God. Indeed, God was my mother’s ground.

My friend Michael Olson shared this with me. It is called “Catching Pigs”, and it is thought provoking.

There is a chemistry professor in a large college that had some exchange students in the class.

One day while the class was in the lab the Professor noticed a young man (an exchange student) who kept rubbing his back. The professor asked the young man what was the matter, and the student told him that he had been shot while fighting communists in his native country who were trying to overthrow his country's government and install a new communist regime.

In the midst of his story, he looked at the professor and asked a strange question. He asked “Do you know how to catch wild pigs?”

The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the punch line. The young man said that it was no joke. “You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs find it and begin to come everyday to eat the free corn. When they are used to coming everyday, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming. When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again and you put up another side of the fence. They get used to that and start to eat again. You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate in the last side.

The pigs, who are used to the free corn, start to come through the gate to eat that free corn again, you then slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd. Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom. They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught. Soon they go back to eating the free corn. They are so used to that, that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity. The young man then told the professor that is exactly what he sees happening to America. The government keeps pushing us toward communism and socialism and keeps spreading the free corn out in the form of programs such as supplemental income, tax credit for unearned income, tax exemptions, tobacco subsidies, dairy subsidies, payments not to plant crops, welfare, medicine, drugs, etc., while we continually lose our freedoms – just a little at a time.

One should always remember two truths:

1. There is no such thing as a free lunch, and

2. You can never hire someone to provide a service for you cheaper than you can do it yourself.

If you see that all of this wonderful government 'help' is a problem confronting the future of democracy in America, you might want to send this on to your friends.

However, if you think the free ride is essential to your way of life, then you will probably delete this email, but God help us all when the gate slams shut!

Quote for the day: “The problems we face today are there because the people who work for a living are now outnumbered by those who vote for a living.”

To continue about Obamacare, it appears we now have a Supreme Court that has little respect for the U.S. Constitution. They simply do whatever they want to do, and make up whatever reasons they can to justify their decisions.

That sounds really bad, but that is the truth. Thanks to this Supreme Court, we are stuck with Obamacare – at least for now.

I will continue with the rest of the 15 reasons why Obamacare is a disaster:

#6. Obamacare is going to impose nightmarish paperwork burdens on doctors, hospitals, and the rest of the healthcare system. This will significantly increase our healthcare costs as a nation.

I just read a publication from the California Coalition for Immigration Reform listing 15 reasons spelling out why Obamacare if implemented will destroy our beloved U.S. as we know it. I will share the information with you in this and the next Commentary. Please remember Obamacare will probably go away if Obama loses this election!

With a 5-4 decision to uphold Obamacare, America is now headed for a complete and total disaster as it is fully implemented. Obamacare is going to absolutely flood and shred the infrastructure of our medical system, send health insurance premiums soaring, dramatically expand the size and scope of government, fundamentally alter relationships between doctors and their patients, and is one of the largest tax increases in U.S. history. It is also going to add about $1 Trillion (with a T) to our national debt over the next decade.

Here is the beginning of the 15 reasons why Obamacare is a disaster:

#1. According the U.S. Supreme Court, the federal government has the power to force you to buy private goods and services. Now that this Bill has been opened, what else will we be forced to buy in the future?

#2. Obamacare is another step away from individual liberty, and another step towards a nanny state where the government dominates our lives from cradle to grave.

#3. The IRS is now going to be given the task of hunting down and penalizing millions of Americans that do not have any health insurance. The Obama administration has give the IRS an extra $500 million outside of the normal appropriations process to help them enforce the provisions of Obamacare.

#4. Obamacare imposes more than 20 new taxes on the American people (Google Americans for tax reform, for details).

#5. To control costs and promote efficiency, Obamacare limits the treatment options that doctors and patients can consider. This will result in a decrease in life expectancy in the United States.

Listeners: I will hopefully continue this Commentary next week with the next ten reasons why we must defeat Obamacare.

Our Country traditionally has always been almost overly generous. I will explain this through the following Commentary which is in my book. I wrote it in the fall of 2009, three years ago, and hopefully this idiocy has been changed realistically. It is called “This is an insult”. This is what our elected officials have done to you and me. A great thank you to all of us. I am almost ashamed to tell you this, but I will.

From an Emergency Room doctor – “I live and work in a border state overrun with illegals. They make more money having kids than we earn working fulltime.

Today I had a 25-year-old with eight kids. That is right – eight, all illegal anchor babies, and she, the mother, had the nicest nails, cellphone, handbag, clothing, etc. She makes about $1500 monthly for each child. Do the math.

I used to say we are the dumbest nation on earth. Now I must say, and sadly admit, you are the dumbest people on earth, and that includes me, for we elected the idiot idea, foolishly, and have passed the Bills that allow this. Sorry, we need a Revolution! Vote them all out of office.”

Remember, in November, we have a golden opportunity to clean out the entire House and one-third of the Senate. This is an insult, and a kick in the butt to all of us. Check it out, and if this idiocy still exists, get mad, and pass it on to everyone you know.

Let’s continue a little longer with the nostalgia. This is called “What Paul Harvey once wrote – ” We tried so hard to make things better for our kids that we made them worse. For my grandchildren, I would like better. I would really like for them to know about hand-me-down clothes, homemade ice cream, and leftover meatloaf sandwiches. I really would. I hope you learn humility by being humiliated, and that you learn honesty by being cheated. I hope nobody gives you a brand new car when you are 16. It will be good if at least one time you can see puppies born and your old dog put to sleep. I hope you get a black eye fighting for something you believe in. I hope you have to share a bathroom with your younger brother or sister. It is alright if you have to draw a line down the middle of the room, but when she or he wants to crawl under the covers with you because she or he is scared, I hope you let him or her. I hope you have to walk uphill to school with your friends and that you live in a town where you can do it safely. If you want a slingshot, I hope your Dad teaches you how to make one instead of buying one. I hope you learn to dig in the dirt, and read books. When you learn to use computers, I hope you will also learn to add and subtract in your head. I hope that when you talk back to your mother you learn what Ivory soap tastes like. May you skin your knee climbing a mountain, burn your hand on a stove, and stick your tongue on a frozen flag pole. I sure hope you make time to sit on a porch with your Grandma and Grandpa, and go fishing with your Uncle. May you feel sorrow at a funeral and joy during the holidays. I hope your mother punishes you if you throw a baseball through your neighbor’s window and that she hugs and kisses you at Hanukkah or Christmastime when you give her a plaster mold of our hand. These things I wish for you – tough times, disappointment, hard work, and happiness. To me, it is the only way to appreciate life.